Two of the elephants being moved, Luk Chai (centre) and Pathi Harn (right), play with a female, Tukta, at Taronga Zoo Sydney in 2011.

AAP: Tracey Nearmy

The Taronga Western Plains Zoo is planning to build a multimillion dollar home for three male Asian elephants due to arrive in Dubbo next year.

The bulls, Pathi Harn, Luk Chai and Gung, are being moved to the west to free up space at Taronga's Sydney zoo.

A development application for the $3 million barn, including heated stalls, paddocks with pools, shelters and feeding areas, has been submitted to Dubbo City Council.

Zoo spokesman Todd Jenkins says it is significant news after about a decade since there was a male elephant in Dubbo.

"At this stage our focus will be getting these males from Taronga, getting them settled into their new home," he said.

"Because, very much like in the wild, when you push them out of the group they have to find their feet and find a new home and live on their own for the most part so our focus will be absolutely on getting them settled in."

He says the new elephant enclosure will be built to the highest safety standards for keepers and animals alike.

One of the bulls being moved to Dubbo, Pathi Harn, was the calf involved in an attack against a keeper in Sydney in October 2012.

Mr Jenkins says the facility will allow keepers to care for the animals without endangering themselves.

"The new facility has all sorts of different areas where we can actually work with the elephants without actually going in with them, and if we have to do any work close up we have what we call a PC wall," he said

"A PC wall is where we can work with these animals so we can actually adjust this wall to get to different areas like the ears or the back or the trunk or the feet without the elephant actually coming into contact with the keeper."

He says while breeding is not an immediate priority, the new enclosure will include facilities for the future.

"Obviously it's a long way away for us for the breeding but we have incredibly talented staff working with them and we've just been able to step in the right direction.

"Of course you want to keep breeding for the viability of the population within the region and world wide it would put us up there with other facilities in North America and Europe and so on."